Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an image reading control apparatus for controlling image reading processing performed by an image reading apparatus and an image reading method thereof.
Description of the Related Art
Conventionally, an image reading apparatus is known in which predetermined processing set at a personal computer (PC) side is executed when an operation from an operation unit provided in the image reading apparatus, e.g., scanner, is detected by the PC connected to the image reading apparatus. Japanese Patent Laid-open Publication No. 2010-239263 discusses an image reading apparatus in which, as the predetermined processing, a scanner driver is started up to cause the image reading apparatus to read an image. With the above described configuration, a user can cause the image reading apparatus to execute image reading processing using the scanner driver of the PC with an operation performed at an image reading apparatus side (i.e., on-line processing).
Further, an image reading apparatus having, for example, a print function capable of printing image data acquired by reading an image is known. In this case, the image reading apparatus can read the image without involving communication with a PC (i.e., off-line processing).
In a case where the image reading apparatus performs the image reading processing by using the scanner driver of the PC in response to an operation from an operation unit of the image reading apparatus, the user provides a reading instruction from the operation unit of the image reading apparatus every time the user exchanges a document. There is an image reading apparatus in which, in a case where the image reading apparatus accepts the reading instruction from the operation unit, the image reading apparatus inhibits acceptance of a job execution instruction according to the other off-line processing for a predetermined period. Further, there is an image reading apparatus in which, when the image reading apparatus receives an instruction to start reading an image from the operation unit of the image reading apparatus, the image reading instruction according to the off-line processing is inhibited.
In a case where the image reading is performed by using the scanner driver in response to the operation from the operation unit of the image reading apparatus while the document is exchanged, if processing to be performed at the PC side in the former read-out processing has not ended yet, the PC does not start executing the following reading instruction. On the other hand, in a case where a start-reading instruction is not provided from the PC even though a predetermined time has passed after the following reading instruction is provided from the operation unit of the image reading apparatus, some image reading apparatus unban a state that the other reading instruction is inhibited since a possible abnormality occurs at the PC side. After the inhibiting state is unbanned, the image reading apparatus can accept the image reading instruction according to the off-line processing and can cause the scanner driver to read the image according to the off-line processing.
However, in a case where it is only taking time to perform the processing at the PC side in the former reading processing, i.e., in a case where no abnormality occurs at the PC side, the PC instructs the image reading apparatus to start reading an image based on the following reading instruction when the former reading processing is completed. Therefore, in a case where the user has set the document in the image reading apparatus to cause the image reading apparatus to read the image of the document according to the off-line processing, such a problem may occur that a start-reading instruction to the following reading instruction is provided to the image reading apparatus and therefore an unexpected image may be transmitted to the PC side. Alternatively, in the image reading apparatus, a start of the operation to read an image according to the off-line processing may inhibit an acceptance of the other reading instruction. As a result thereof, a start-reading instruction based on the following reading instruction from the PC may not be accepted.